Statement from Edward Snowden in Moscow - <AUTHOR> http://wikileaks.org/Statement-from-Edward-Snowden-in.html?snow <comment><USER3> I'd really like to see Wikileaks devoting more of its time, energy, and fund- raising into breaking news about government-operated surveillance programs in the last two countries where Edward Snowden has been located, namely China and Russia. As an American citizen and voter, I'm still mulling over what I think should be the correct policy response to the revelations about NSA claims about NSA data-gathering programs, but I have deep ties to China as a speaker and reader of Chinese and a long-time student of the language, culture, and history of China, and I have similar connections, less thoroughly developed, to Russia. People everywhere just wanna be free. We ought to be hearing a lot more about all the various governmental data-gathering and surveillance programs, everywhere in the world, and of course we should also be learning more about the actions of private business corporations to gather data on all of us. That Wikileaks tells us much more about the United States federal government than about any of those other entities tells me something about Wikileaks, and perhaps tells me something favorable about the United States.

If you really want to be an idealistic but hard-headed freedom-fighter, mobilizing an effective popular movement for more freedom wherever you live, I suggest you read deeply in the publications of the Albert Einstein Institution,

[http://www.aeinstein.org/organizationsde07.html](http://www.aeinstein.org/organizationsde07.html)

remembering that the transition from dictatorship to democracy described in those publications is an actual historical process with recent examples around the world that we can all learn from.

AFTER EDIT: Good catch by the readers who noticed the non-American English in the Wikileaks press release here (mentioned in other comments in this thread). The press release kindly submitted here is plainly not Edward Snowden's verbatim words, but more self-publicizing from Wikileaks.

<comment> old-gregg

      >I'd really like to see Wikileaks devoting more of its time, energy,
      >and fund-raising into breaking news about government-operated
      >surveillance programs in the last two countries where Edward
      >Snowden has been located, namely China and Russia.

I cannot speak for China, but majority of Russians lack a natural compass/taste for civil liberties and human rights: they haven't had the time to develop one. Their version of PRISM is called SORM-2 ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SORM](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SORM)) - <USER2> was launched with a complete lack of secrecy and, predictably, was met with public apathy. There are no news to break. :(

<comment><USER4> That's the thing that's so jarring about the U.S policy. Their private ideology, or whatever guides their actions, is quite obviously contradictory to their publicly espoused beliefs. The Russian and Chinese government are at least pretty direct about their ideology and intentions.

<comment><USER5> Well I do hate to say it but we've always had an "us or them" mentality to the rest of the world. I mean we were so isolationist that we were willing to watch Europe burn from afar rather than do anything. There's no telling what would have happened without Pearl Harbor; the U.S. may never have joined the war against Germany at all, in fact.

You'll notice that much of the furor has come from the idea that the NSA might be watching what _Americans_ are doing. For everything else there was effectively a big giant "Of _course_ they were bugging $FOO, that's their _job_ ".

Obviously Europe doesn't feel the same way (and didn't with ECHELON)...

<comment><USER6> > I mean we were so isolationist that we were willing to watch Europe burn > from afar rather than do anything. There's no telling what would have > happened without Pearl Harbor; the U.S. may never have joined the war > against Germany at all, in fact.

Yes, and? Did Europe intervene in the American Civil War, or in any of the multitude of conflicts in the Americas, East Asia, or Africa over the past 200 years? Even the rest of Europe abandoned Austria and Czechoslovakia to the Germans before Poland fell. Going to war is a huge commitment, and doing it purely for the benefit of a continent that has spent the last several centuries hell-bent on destroying itself sounds like a really bad idea.

The worst part is, when the US government _does_ see a situation that calls for military intervention, like Vietnam or Iraq, that gets criticized as well.

<comment><USER7> Do read up more on the history of both wars as 'seeing a situation' was a pretty simple-minded opinion there. It took much much more than a call for justice to move the military gears. There were always political or economic agendas hidden under any wars and that makes one reason for criticism. I don't even want to get started on other reasons.

<comment><USER6> > There were always political or economic agendas hidden under any wars

Which is why the US was reluctant to get involved in the World Wars. You can't have it both ways.

<comment><USER7> Interestingly, there have been multiple speculations on US's involvement in WW2:

One is the good democratic fight versus the bad facists. US were hampered by the isolationist views held by quite a number of senators at the time, hence there was no direct involvement until after Pearl Harbour attack, which resulted in an almost uniform senatorial agreement on declaration of war.

Another is that US could have kept maintaining the profit stream from arms- dealing to both sides (Germany still imported American arms prior to 1941 or so, if I'm not mistaken) but got unwillingly dragged into the war.

Yet another more cynical view is that after the huge Axis loss at USSR, US just saw the opportunity to join in and mope up what's left of the Axis since winners get to dictate the terms. The Pearl Harbour event was a surprising but timely excuse.

<comment><USER5> > Yet another more cynical view is that after the huge Axis loss at USSR

"huge Axis losses" in the USSR didn't start happening until 1943 though. Even the Nazi defeat at Stalingrad wasn't until the end of 1942.

So that view is not merely cynical, it's also simply inaccurate.

<comment><USER7> I beg to differ. Operation Barbarossa was the one turning point of the USSR invasion. Stalingrad was merely the consequence IMO as Barbarossa had led to German army being both weakened and stretched too far out. They simply could not compare to the Soviet war machine's recover-ability and production.

Of course Pearl Harbour was what got the US directly involved and nuking Japan out in the end, but I hold the speculation that without Pearl Harbour, US would still declare war to either Germany or Japan anyway because of several reasons below: 1) US businesses were being harmed by the Axis, i.e. Germans attacking cargo ships meant to supply arms to Britain. Sooner or later the piled up losses would justify the entry in front of Congress.

2) The Japanese was expanding fast in Asia and they would not stop just short of US territorial waters, plus the imposed embargo had been pissing the Japanese off anyway. A clash was inevitable.

3) Letting USSR being the major player and eventual winner meant letting communism spread throughout Europe. There had to be a sizable participation from the Capitalist group in the war and the rest of the Western bloc was too tattered to muster that up.

<comment><USER6> In 1941, it probably didn't seem obvious that Russia would prevail. The cynical, hegemonic move for capitalism certainly wouldn't have been to ally with the Soviets, but rather to let both totalitarian regimes fight each other to exhaustion and sweep up the remains of both.

<comment><USER7> Hypothetically, a win for either Axis or Eastern bloc would spell disaster for capitalism. That practically guarantee that US would join in the fray, one way or another, indirectly or directly. Pearl Harbour helped alot with the decision making, as other members pointed out in this thread and the general consensus on America's participation in WW2.

<comment><USER6> Right, I'm just saying counterfactually, if you were in charge of a global capitalist conspiracy, you'd sell weapons to both sides until Germany and Russia were both weakened and then conquer both, and then you have global capitalist hegemony.

The fact that that's _not_ how it worked out is pretty good evidence that there wasn't a global capitalist conspiracy behind the whole thing after all.

<comment><USER7> Well, it was pretty much a big win for America after the war ended, economically with all that arms trade and diplomatically as the affirmed leader figure of Western bloc.

<comment><USER6> It's easier to say that now that the US won the Cold War as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's probably too late now, but I feel like it was a mistake not to release a public encryption key along with his initial effluence of records. I for one believe that this was written by Snowden, but it seems like an obvious use of some basic form of identity signing.

Edit: It now seems like there is some reasonable doubt that this notice was forged. I still remain confident this is no forgery, but the point I'd like to make is that there may in fact be an identity question -- and that is a problem with a technical solution that unfortunately seems not to have been leveraged.

<comment><USER9> He used 'have' after United States of America, which is a Britishism. To Americans, 'United States of America' is singular and would use "has" in this particular sentence:

 _For decades the United States of America have been one of the strongest defenders of the human right to seek asylum._

Maybe I'm overanalyzing but I don't think this is a verbatim statement from Snowden.

<comment><USER10> Maybe it was changed since you saw it, but the statement now reads:

"...the United States of America has been..."

Edit to add: The statement as quoted at [http://boingboing.net/2013/07/01/snowden-asks-russia-for- asy...](http://boingboing.net/2013/07/01/snowden-asks-russia-for-asylum.html) has the original version with "have" still in there.

Here's a screenshot from twitter of the original - [https://twitter.com/ClaraJeffery/status/351833289000112128](https://twitter.com/ClaraJeffery/status/351833289000112128)

<comment><USER5> So it was changed, and not flagged as being changed. Interesting...

<comment><USER11> Not that interesting. It's probably because they proofread and edit statements in a manner typical of any writing fitting of a professional appearance, and didn't want tinfoil hats with an anti-wikileaks agenda to take cheapshots based on the benign edits, when the substance was not materially affected.

<comment><USER5> I work with coders and developers from the U.K. They _know_ what en_US is, and they know what en_GB is, and it's very obvious which is which.

So to claim that WikiLeaks would fixup _all_ of Snowden's writings to conform to en_GB and then switch it right back to en_US after HN notices is rather surreal.

 _At best_ you could claim that Harrison herself simply transcribed Snowden's _speech_ and that no one caught it until it was posted. But that still wouldn't explain what happened to some of the missing words that Snowden would have said. And that still wouldn't explain why WikiLeaks revised a statement so important without so much as a mention of proofreading corrections post- facto.

<comment><USER12> If they _" know_" en_US and en_GB, then assuming the statement is not actually Snowden's but rather was written by a Brit, why did that Brit get it wrong? If making a mistake while falsifying a statement from Snowden is plausible, then why isn't making a mistake while editing or transcribing plausible?

I think you need to loosen your tinfoil.

<comment><USER5> It may very well be tinfoil. But right now the totality of the evidence points me to the idea that this isn't 100% Snowden's words. Forget about the grammar and punctuation; read the _words_.

Does that sound like the same person talking about civil liberties and how Obama didn't change enough for him, and being ready to stand up for what he believes in? Or does that sound more like a certain _other_ ego at opposition to the U.S. government and especially its President?

<comment><USER12> It probably isn't all of his words, but so long as he stands behind his name on it, who cares?

The concern would be if wikileaks were completely fabricating this, but I see no evidence for that. (Nor any motivation.)

<comment><USER5> > The concern would be if wikileaks were completely fabricating this, but I > see no evidence for that.

I doubt they are fabricating it, but honestly they have Snowden in as much of a bind as the U.S. does now. They are his only source of support right now... what does he do if they take it away? He's in a web of very unequal relationships right now.

<comment><USER12> What are they actually providing him with right now? Money for food I guess?

<comment><USER5> Airfare to his next destination and lodging costs as well. One of the articles said that they even paid for his trip out of Hong Kong so I'm not sure how much cash he has on him.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> It's almost as if he's deliberately provoking the most rabid response possible from the United States Government.

Regardless of what happens to him; he is writing himself into the pages of history.

His actions have opened the possibility of Western Europe defecting from the US led coalition that has dominated world affairs for the past 70 years. Which is not a result anyone could have predicted.

<comment><USER14> > His actions have opened the possibility of Western Europe defecting from the > US led coalition that has dominated world affairs for the past 70 years. > Which is not a result anyone could have predicted.

What changed compared to previous US spying scandals? (e.g. Echelon and the 2003 European council wiretaps from the US)

<comment><USER15> Your parents and grandparents are more likely to have read about this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It occurs to me that there is a kind of deep hypocrisy for those who make the rules to claim that someone broke the rules. Rules require focus and diligence to apply, and they favor those that apply them regularly, vs those to whom they are applied.

I suspect that the Obama administration broke may of their own rules rushing through the a change in status that fast - a bureaucracy the size of the US doesn't process anything quickly without breaking the rules.

The Russians are clearly using Snowden as a pawn, probably because Russia is threatened by people like Snowden just as much as the US is. Snowden threatens those who make the rules, and then apply them fully to others and not at all to themselves and their cohorts.

For the third time in my life (the first two courtesy Bush Jr.) I'm deeply ashamed of my government.

<comment><USER17> Which rules do you suspect the Obama administration broke?

In general the reason things take a long time to do in a bureaucracy is because of the required approvals from many different officials. If the President or a cabinet secretary wants something to happen now, this is less likely to be necessary.

<comment><USER18> "The tree that doesn't bend, breaks."

"Bend too far, and you're already broken."

It's more an issue of redefining the rules than breaking them. Court oversight becomes a secret rubber stamp that's never denied. Search becomes querying the database we already have. Non-citizenship becomes 51% confidence. Spying on enemy nations during wartime becomes Hey, Everybody's Doing It, Why Can't We? ...etc

<comment><USER17> That's interesting but it doesn't answer the question of which rules the Obama administration broke by revoking Snowden's passport.

<comment><USER19> Not sure which, if any, were broken, but here's a quick rundown of existing rules I've found thus far: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5976018](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5976018)

I'm rather out of my depth where passport laws are concerned, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I'm not taking sides here but Snowden is wrong on the facts about passport revocation. It is perfectly within the established law to revoke the passports of fugitives with federal arrest warrants. It doesn't make you a "stateless person" or "exile" you -- you're still welcome to return voluntarily.

The relevant U.S. law is 22 CFR 51.70 and 51.72 [http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CFR-1999-title22-vol1/xml/CFR-1...](http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CFR-1999-title22-vol1/xml/CFR-1999-title22-vol1-sec51-70.xml)

He does have a point that restricting travel does make it harder for you to seek asylum. But that's nothing new.

<comment><USER21> Unfortunate this is as far down the comments as it is.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> There are several interesting aspects to this story.

The first is obviously the revelations about NSA "overreach".

The second is that this guy could've remained hidden but he put his name behind the revelations rather than choosing the far safer path of being an "anonymous source". This lends his revelations more credence and you have to respect the guy for standing by his convictions. Maybe he would've been found out had he stayed in the shadows but he certainly didn't try to do that.

The third is that the US is very much two-faced here. It seems clear that the surveillance is being justified by a technical ruling to do with US vs foreign persons, a classified ruling no less. While this might be a fine legal argument, it doesn't engender support amongst foreign powers when you tell them you have every right to spy on their citizens but oh, by the way, can you do us a solid and hand over that fugitive?

In what world does the US think they'll get cooperation from anyone when they aren't treated not even as equals but with simple decency? So the foreign policy apparatus resorts to bullying tactics.

The fourth is that both China and Russia were _blatantly_ thumbing their noses at the US. I see no world in which Russia hands the guy over so the actions of the US have done little more than force a guy in possession of Top Secret information to be harboured by a rival. Congratulations on that statecraft, Obama, Biden and Kerry.

What's more it's made the US appear internationally weak.

The last is that the various players on Snowden's side do seem to have screwed the pooch on this one by both issuing a letter of safe passage and not having some kind of contingency when the US did the predictable thing and revoked his passport. This could hardly have been an unprecedented move.

So good luck to you, Edward Snowden. I hope your sacrifice hasn't been in vein. The optimist in me hopes that a future president will pardon you and otherwise reverse this self-destructive course the US is on.

<comment><USER23> > The second is that this guy could've remained hidden but he put his name > behind the revelations rather than choosing the far safer path of being an > "anonymous source". This lends his revelations more credence and you have to > respect the guy for standing by his convictions. Maybe he would've been > found out had he stayed in the shadows but he certainly didn't try to do > that.

I think that internal auditing would have very quickly identified him as the source the moment the leaks hit the papers.

At least this way they have a little bit of a PR shitstorm if they disappear him, as opposed to if he was totally anonymous.

Also, by doing that video interview, he gets to shape the narrative a tiny bit by pointing out all the opportunity he had to be malicious that he didn't use, illustrating that he's simply not. It's hard not to like the guy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> He's not still complaining about his _passport_ , is he? Did Assange tell him to say that too?

A passport means that the host nation is comfortable with the person traveling abroad. For what should be obvious reasons the U.S. would rather he be back home (to stand trial). Even if you disagree with everything the NSA has done or will do, he technically broke the law. If the U.S. considers itself to observe the rule of law, then they have to pursue him as much as they'd pursue anyone else.

The U.S. has stripped persons of their citizenship for things as mundane as fraud, so this is hardly a made-up case for Snowden.

In fact, it's _so not made up_ that there are existing procedures for when a passport may be revoked [1] [2]. Note that despite the foia_reading_room in the URL of [1], it is simply the U.S. Attorney's Manual, which is accessible directly from [http://www.justice.gov/usao/index.html](http://www.justice.gov/usao/index.html) .

[1] [http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/tit...](http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/title9/15mcrm.htm#9-15.640)

[2] [http://travel.state.gov/passport/ppi/info/info_870.html](http://travel.state.gov/passport/ppi/info/info_870.html)

Edit: Also, since when did a conversation without an exchange of consideration or an agreement to perform certain actions become "wheeling and _dealing_ "? This is the kind of stuff that has turned me off from Assange a long time ago; he's just as willing to distort as a government, as long as it suits his purpose.

<comment><USER24> Careful there. Revoking a passport is not the same as stripping a person of their citizenship. The press release itself seems to create some confusion here - Snowden is not stateless because he is still a US citizen, even though he doesn't currently have a passport.

Revoking a passport is routine when felony charges are filed. Citizenship on the other hand is much harder to remove, even if the US government had any interest in doing so (it doesn't in this case - it wants him back home).

Naturalized citizens can be stripped of citizenship in extreme cases when they're found to have lied on their citizenship applications. I'm not aware of any circumstance in which natural-born citizens can have their citizenship removed without them voluntarily renouncing it first.

<comment><USER5> Right. My point was only that the more extreme action (of stripping citizenship) has also occurred. Stripping someone of citizenship would tend to imply revoking of their passport, as it is indeed much more severe.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I find it most interesting, and perhaps frightening, that Snowden's passport was revoked. I've been thinking quite a bit about it since that bit of news broke, and since it's referenced in this statement, it's back in my head.

I winced a bit at the claim of being a stateless person, as I'd previously understood that to mean lacking citizenship _anywhere_ , not being without a passport for travel. Perhaps I've been wrong about that all these years.

I'm still researching, but so far, I've found the following passport- revocation authorities:

1\. Obtained illegally or through fraud

2\. Altered or misused (no definition yet on 'misused')

3\. Issued to persons whose citizenship is cancelled

4\. Non-payment of child support

5\. Non-repayment of repatriation loan

6\. Persons convicted of sex tourism

7\. Persons convicted of drug trafficking

8\. [based on comment below] Standing warrants for arrest (and other standing legal/court orders against the bearer)

Interestingly enough, 22 USC § 2721 states that:

> _A passport may not be denied issuance, revoked, restricted, or otherwise > limited because of any speech, activity, belief, affiliation, or membership, > within or outside the United States, which, if held or conducted within the > United States, would be protected by the first amendment to the Constitution > of the United States._

I've yet to find an authority to revoke a passport from a citizen who is openly seeking political asylum.

However, there is 22 USC § 217a:

> _A passport shall be valid for a period of ten years from the date of issue, > except that the Secretary of State may limit the validity of a passport to a > period of less than ten years in an individual case or on a general basis > pursuant to regulation._

So, there's that. Perhaps this is one such individual case.

Additionally, the law requires the DOS to send the passport owner written notification of revocation. I wonder if the US is considering a press statement to be such written notice?

Any lawyers versed in passport issues know whether revoking a passport in a situation like this runs afoul of law or established precedent?

[edit: formatting failure on my part]

<comment><USER25> > A federal or state law enforcement agency may request the denial of a > passport on several regulatory grounds under 22 CFR 51.70 and 51.72. The > principal law enforcement reasons for passport denial are a federal warrant > of arrest, a federal or state criminal court order, a condition of parole or > probation forbidding departure from the United States (or the jurisdiction > of the court), or a request for extradition.

[http://travel.state.gov/passport/ppi/info/info_870.html](http://travel.state.gov/passport/ppi/info/info_870.html)

So I think the passport revocation was in fact legal since there was a request for extradition and a federal warrant of arrest.

<comment><USER19> Thanks. Hadn't found that one yet.

Any idea on how that plays into the open requests for asylum?

Also, I'm assuming the statute uses passport denial to also include passport revocation?

<comment><USER20> Yes, 22 CFR 51.72 says they can revoke for any of the same reasons they'd deny, including an outstanding federal arrest warrant. Seems pretty cut and dried to me.

As for how it interacts with asylum, well, it doesn't. If states had an obligation not to pursue or interfere with the travel of a fugitive seeking asylum, then take a guess what a lot of fugitives would do.

Generally if you're going to seek asylum, it's not the country you're fleeing FROM that facilitates your emigration, it's the country you're traveling TO.

Well, that's exactly what Snowden did, and got a travel document from the Ecuadorian embassy. But the surprising other half of the story here is that _Ecuador_ revoked that travel document while he was in Moscow. THAT is arguably the main reason why he's in a bind right now, not that he or his advisors expected his US passport to remain valid, which is clearly revokable under the law in these circumstances.

<comment><USER19> Okay, thanks. I figured from what else I'd already researched and read that denial & revocation were essentially equal.

On the interaction with asylum, I did a poor job of being clear. I was wondering more about considerations of asylum given the current situation and the US revoking Snowden's passport. I'd already assumed that a country would revoke (although Snowden's a different kind of fugitive than, say, a murderer attempting to flee). Obviously, no country facilitates emigration of a person they wish to make a political and legal example of. Was wondering more if the revocation makes Snowden look like _more_ of a case for political asylum, or less attractive for potential asylum granters.

The Ecuadorian revocation of travel documents--if their stated reasons are true--is certainly surprising (both for the revocation, and the political liability that they're assessing to Assange in relation to Snowden).

All that aside, revoking a standing passport just strikes me as a very dick move. Almost childish, even. It just screams, "Our allies aren't cooperating with us because we've been abusing them, so we'll just maroon the poor bastard until they cave cos they don't want to deal with him either." Not ineffective, but still a disappointing tactic from the administration.

<comment><USER20> Looks like it's routine to revoke the passports of wanted fugitives. It's not an administration-specific tactic, it's state dept. policy. So no, I wouldn't say that in itself supports or detracts from his appeal for asylum.

<comment><USER19> Ah, okay. That kind of makes it sound more like once charges are filed against a person, passports are revoked. I wonder how swiftly such action typically takes place in comparison to this action.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Accusing the United States of depriving him of the right to seek asylum seems like a tautology to me. If the United States wasn't attempting to bring him back to the US for a trial, he wouldn't need to seek asylum.

Does this mean every country who attempts to prosecute people who subsequently seek asylum is violating "a basic right"?

<comment><USER27> He's accusing the USA of pressuring countries to deny asylum.

<comment><USER26> What is the difference between asking for extradition and pressuring to deny asylum? It just seems like anyone could make that accusation who flees a country to avoid a trial.

<comment><USER28> > _What is the difference between asking for extradition and pressuring to > deny asylum?_

Asylum is considered a basic human right. I've posted elsewhere: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5974330](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5974330)

<comment><USER29> > This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising > from non-political crimes

Anyway, it really doesn't make sense to talk about asylum in relation to the country being _fled_. The declaration is a statement of what the destination state should do when it recognizes a case of persecution. 'Persecution' is inherently a subjective concept.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Obama is saying "You broke the law. We want you back. We won't wheel and deal for you with any country who wants to use you iike a pawn to win some other concession or just enjoy sticking it to us. Take him in at your own risk" Nothing new here or deceitful. Pretty standard operating procedure.

<comment> brown9-2 Exactly. Does Snowden honestly expect to not be charged with a crime that he has admitted to, even if he disagrees with the morality of the crime?

<comment><USER31> > Does Snowden honestly expect to not be charged with a crime that he has > admitted to

What on Earth are you talking about? It's abundantly clear that he expects to be charged with a crime (or at least to be treated as badly or worse as someone charged with a crime). Why do you think he left the USA and is seeking asylum?

<comment><USER30> Then why start with this sentence? "One week ago I left Hong Kong after it became clear that my freedom and safety were under threat for revealing the truth" Wouldn't it be more accurate to say "I went to HK because I thought my freedom and safety would be under threat if I revealed the truth in my home country" I agree with you that's he's known it all along. So this feels like he's manipulating his supporters as he's not really being very honest.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Just an FYI:

Nicolas Maduro, president of Venezuela is in Russia right now. He flies not the national presidential airplane but a cuban plane.

Rumor has it, he visited Russia with the intention of giving Snowden a ride back to Venezuela.

We'll see.

<comment><USER33> Good spot: [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2351981/Is-Ed- Snowde...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2351981/Is-Ed-Snowden-set- claim-asylum-Venezuela-President-Maduro-visits-Russia-tomorrow.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> He's not a 'stateless person'. His passport has been revoked, but he remains a US citizen.

<comment><USER17> Equally he has not been given the penalty of "exile." There is nothing the U.S. would like more than to have Snowden return to U.S. soil.

This stretching of the truth does not engender trust.

<comment><USER35> Exile usually involves a threat of violence if the person returns home. Many exiles are exiles because their home country's government would hurt them if they returned.

"Exile means to be away from one's home (i.e. city, state or country), while either being explicitly refused permission to return and/or being threatened with imprisonment or death upon return." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exile](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exile)

Before calling into question the truth of statements made by a public figure please look up the common definition.

Update:

Websters does not use this exact definition, being a more compact format than wikipedia, but if you look under the examples in Websters you will see "Many chose to live as exiles rather than face persecution." [http://www.merriam- webster.com/dictionary/exile](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/exile)

<comment><USER17> Snowden is not using the common definition of the phrase. He is explicitly using a legal definition when he says "the extralegal penalty of exile."

To argue that any person who cannot return to their home country without being arrested is "extralegally exiled" would mean that any fugitive is "extralegally exiled," an absurd result.

<comment><USER5> It was in fact the one comment I had been about to make. Snowden has chosen to avoid the U.S., explicitly to _avoid_ the legal system. His own father feels he probably technically broke the law so it's hard to claim that the U.S. government has somehow managed to switch all 3 of its branches into a KILL SNOWDEN mode.

If the charges are without merit then one of the very same judges that Snowden feels should be involved in these types of surveillance programs will throw them out.

Snowden's exile may very well be extralegal, but both the exile and the extralegality of it are on Snowden himself.

<comment><USER23> > Snowden has chosen to avoid the U.S., explicitly to avoid the legal system.

No, he's chosen to avoid the US explicitly to avoid torture.

There's nothing legal about that.

<comment><USER5> Are you saying that the US justice system is by definition torture?

If so, I would think Snowden would have made that his moral priority to emphasize. There's no reason to fear "turnkey tyranny" (as he said) when we're already living in a torture regime, is there? In that case there's no key to turn, it's already here!

<comment><USER23> "turnkey tyranny" describes the future consequence for the median citizen.

Torturing those who leak information prior to trial is something that the US government has already demonstrated a willingness to do. It's simply disgraceful - a national shame.

<comment><USER5> Like how those other NSA whistleblowers were "tortured"? Their treatment was wrong, I'll admit, but calling it torture is insulting to those who have actually been waterboarded by the U.S.

<comment><USER36> No, it just means that the US engages in more varieties of torture, some of which we consider to be more severe than the others. That does not mean we can't use the same word to indicate all of them.

And why limit yourself to NSA whistleblowers, a government that has crossed this line has crossed that line in general, not just for some class. All this 'just NSA whistleblowers', 'just whistleblowers', 'just foreigners', 'just enemy combatants' and so on isn't fooling anybody.

Some lines you just don't cross, lest you become that which you claim to fight.

<comment><USER5> > And why limit yourself to NSA whistleblowers, a government that has crossed > this line has crossed that line in general, not just for some class.

Because the claim isn't that "the USA has tortured people". The claim is that the USA will torture _Snowden_. Given the wide disparity in justice systems utilized for U.S. citizens, "enemy combatants", and U.S. military, you have to at least make that broad type of distinction to evaluate the probability of the claim that Snowden will be tortured if he returns.

There's no end to the things you can do or refuse to do if your only justification for that action (or lack thereof) is that a government has, at some time, tortured somebody somewhere.

I agree wholeheartedly that the U.S. needs to account for instances where they torture, but that also doesn't completely invalidate the whole government.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I very much doubt that the United States government is afraid of me. Snowden is a real drama queen.

I don't think that he deserves asylum either. I think he should come back to America, have a public trial with media coverage, and then we can firmly establish if what he did was wrong.

Edit: It appears that I'm unable to reply to the various comments on this, so I'll try to refine what I'm saying:

I _do_ think that whistleblowers are necessary, especially in large, secretive organisations. But I think that Snowden's limbo isn't providing the requisite closure on the matter. I think that he should be compelled to explain his actions in court. I think all whistleblowers should, just as I think that anybody who kills somebody under a make-my-day law should still have their actions examined. Whistle blowing isn't something that somebody does lightly, and i think that should be doubly true for matters of national security.

Additionally, trying to vilify the government in a press statement is silly. Let their actions speak for them, and let your own actions speak for you.

<comment><USER38> What he did was certainly illegal. It's highly debatable as to whether or not it was wrong.

<comment><USER39> If he was tried, couldn't he (at least theoretically) be acquitted by the jury? Honest question; I don't know that much about the U.S. judicial system, but I'm aware of the concept of jury nullification.

(Not that I'm too keen on the possibility that the U.S. government would grant him the chance of a fair trial...)

<comment><USER40> Jury nullification is possible, but it's unusual for any jury members who have heard of it to make the cut.

<comment><USER39> I think courts should be legally obliged to make jurors aware of that fact. Overall, I'm not a huge fan of trial by jury, but the idea that an unjust law (as felt by the general public) can be defeated like that certainly appeals to me.

(I'm not trying to make a point about Snowden's particular case, just speaking in general.)

<comment><USER18> It's in fact the opposite: the jury is explicitly told to judge the case, not the law, and mentioning nullification as a juror will certainly get you thrown out during the selection process, and I've even heard of cases which were sent to mistrial when the jury's intent was revealed. The best way to successfully nullify is to pretend that you've never heard of such a thing.

I do hope there's a demographic shift here. Facing heavy-handed laws regarding drugs and such, web-savvy young people seem to be slowly catching on about tactics like nullification, not talking to police, etc.

<comment><USER41> There has been some movement on this, New Hampshire passed a law requiring the court to allow the defense to inform the jury about nullification: [http://www.policymic.com/articles/10603/jury- nullification-i...](http://www.policymic.com/articles/10603/jury- nullification-in-new-hampshire-becomes-reality)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Damn, we live in a shitty world. And the comments in here are not much better. I wish him the best. It's sad that Ecuador is wavering. What a joke their leader is. First, they're posturing and puffing out their chests, now they look like fools.

</comment><comment> brown9-2 Serious question: how has the US been "extrajudicial"?

Isn't it common to revoke a passport of someone you want to try of a crime and have extradited?

Does one expect the government to assist in your asylum attempts?

I don't believe one has the right to not be charged with a crime, especially one you have admitted to.

<comment><USER23> > Yet now it is being reported that after promising not to do so, the > President ordered his Vice President to pressure the leaders of nations from > which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions.

<comment> brown9-2 I fail to see what is "extralegal" about trying to make sure you can get custody and try the person you've charged with a crime.

Every country in the world that has extradition treaties with other states does the same exact thing every day.

<comment><USER23> Why do you suppose people request asylum from third-party countries? Could you describe a circumstance in which it is a legitimate request should be granted?

<comment> brown9-2 Regardless of how you feel about whether his criminal charges are political there is nothing extralegal about requesting other countries to turn over the person you've charged with a crime.

It cannot be _extra_ , meaning outside, the legal system, when all you have done is made a request within the established legal system and diplomatic customs.

<comment><USER23> We have no idea what kind of pressures the US has brought to bear against those considering his requests.

He has the right to seek it. Closed door pressure against those who can grant it is very certainly extralegal interference.

If they have any legitimate legal reason to interfere with his asylum requests to third parties, why not just charge him with a crime that those third parties would see as valid, or exclude torture from his potential punishments?

This is not about extradition, it's about asylum. Presumably you only grant asylum if you believe an extradition request is bullshit to begin with.

The US only has one non-scumbag move here, and that's to charge him with a crime or crimes, and make a credible commitment that his potential treatment before, during, and after the trial doesn't violate his basic human rights.

Going behind closed doors doesn't suddenly make the charges more plausible (espionage? really? he gave the info only to journos, spoke to no govts) or magically clean up the US's history of human rights abuses and torture against enemies of the military, be it Manning or al-Awlaki.

Bad or good, guilty or innocent - it is always wrong to turn someone over to be tortured.

<comment> brown9-2 Are you suggesting that Snowden is aware of these backchannel threats then?

The US isn't in the habit of ensuring that the rule of law will be fulfilled since that is still the default posture of the government.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> One thing that concerns me is that many Americans are adopting what is essentially a Tory/Loyalist attitude towards these events, without understanding the Tory/Loyalist political philosophy of dissidence, which differs from 'civil disobedience' and 'non-violent resistance' (those are the _other_ guys).

Don't get me wrong -- we can't all be Patriots and Revolutionaries -- but our history has ill-fitted us to be _good_ at being Tories and Loyalists. Those were the bad guys in all our grade-school stories ... and now we _are_ those bad guys.

The classical Tory theory of dissidence is called "Passive Obedience." This doesn't mean bending over and being a wimp. It means being obedient to higher authority (God and Constitutional Law), while seemingly disobeying usurpers and tyrants, who are themselves violating the higher Law -- constitutional, moral, and natural. The "Passive" part is an old word meaning suffering (like the Passion of Christ).

Edward Snowden has given us a very good example of Passive Obedience -- _if_ he is correct the programs are indeed unconstitutional. He certainly is suffering for his beliefs, and is fleeing, not resisting or rebelling against the State. Failure to obey the commands of usurpers and tyrants, or to obey bad law in defiance of the dictates of one's conscience, are not required even of Loyalists and Tories.

The fact that Tories and Loyalists, which the American people have become, are condemning his actions, shows only that we have forgotten how to be good Redcoats, as well as most certainly having forgotten how to be good Patriots.

As good Tories (not good Patriots though), Loyal to the American State, we have the right to petition our sovereign -- the American People, not its representative Government -- i.e., to request a constitutional convention to strike down these Star Chamber courts, redress the alleged tyranny, and end the usurpations against our Sovereign's previously constituted declarations, and granted Bill of Rights.

As far as Snowden's flight is concerned, Sir Thomas Hobbes gives a very clear explanation of both Passive Obedience and the right of the dissident to flee, in an attempt to evade the sure punishment he would otherwise receive with or without justice (however if he is caught he must meekly accept his Passion and martyrdom, without resistance -- Civil Disobedience and Resistance are the contrary of the Tory doctrine).

Time to pick sides -- but if we are going to be Tories all, let us not be _bad_ ones. These are the times that try men's souls.

</comment><comment><USER28> Article 14 - Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.

This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

[http://www.ichrp.org/en/article_14_udhr](http://www.ichrp.org/en/article_14_udhr)

<comment><USER44> I hope you aren't saying that Snowden's crime is contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

<comment><USER28> I'm not judging, I'm providing the text for the Article he referenced in his statement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> If there were ever a case for a second passport, this is one.

You can get buy one for $135,000. This is what Derek Sivers did. [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3944339](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3944339)

[https://sivers.org/comfort](https://sivers.org/comfort)

[http://www.sovereignman.com/lifestyle-design/how-to- obtain-a...](http://www.sovereignman.com/lifestyle-design/how-to-obtain-a- second-passport-10112/)

</comment><comment><USER46> To imply that the US is somehow out of order to pursue his extradition makes no sense. What does he expect them to do?

IMHO, he should not have run. I don't think he would have any trouble convincing 12 people that what he did was the right thing. Running was bad form.

I don't like this guy, and I don't trust him.

<comment><USER47> Then show him up. Put your money where your mouth is by doing what you think is right.

In the meantime, let's get back to the message, not the messenger.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> A meta comment.

It reflects strongly on the state of our world now that I was more concerned about the fallout from visiting wikileaks.org than I was by the latest information coming from Snowden.

<comment><USER49> I think it reflects more strongly on your own paranoia, if you really worry that just visiting wikileaks might get you arrested or something.

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> Is the world a different place after 9/11 .. heck yes!

How can the govt. prevent such an event from happening again or at least attempt to prevent it from happening again? Only way I can think is to invade every citizen's privacy of every nation, as they have done.

It seems for us the US there is no win win and with human nature there never is. If another 9/11 happens we'd be crying why didnt the govt. do more though the govt. is doing more and now we are crying what the hell are they doing?

Humans..we're never satisfied!

<comment><USER51> _How can the govt. prevent such an event from happening again or at least attempt to prevent it from happening again?_

You don't. The price of freedom is the risk of getting hurt because the bad guys are in advantage. You don't step out of your front door with a gun and shoot everybody on the street because they may rob you - you get robbed and only after that you try to catch, charge and sentence the guy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> This reads like the statement of someone who realizes it might be his last.

</comment><comment><USER53> Exposing US surveillance of US citizens is clearly whistleblowing and a good thing. Taking government laptops with NSA information, telling the Chinese what sites of theirs the NSA hacked, and then releasing information about NSA listening in on others (outside of the US) goes well into the realm of breaking the law and should have consequences. Of course, taking a tour of our adversaries doesn't help his cause much...

Also, I find it hard to swallow those who are up in arms about NSA spying on non-US citizens... seriously??? What do they think the NSA was formed to do??? That should not be a surprise...

I do worry that Wikileaks is pretty much hijacking his agenda and substituting their own...

</comment><comment><USER24> There is little doubt he is winning the war of public opinion at this point - certainly overseas, and possibly back at home.

<comment><USER18> Back at home is questionable. He's got the backing of the young and the technorati, but the traditional media is wavering between "Just The Facts" to sell a manhunt, and labeling him an outright traitor who gave secrets to The Enemy. A great many people take the latter at face value and don't pursue the matter any further.

He might have the backing of libertarians and the far left, but these were people already opposed to the known over-reach of state power. Honestly, if there's any hope of a significant sway in mainstream public opinion, I think it's going to come from the Tea Party.

<comment><USER23> My dad is about the most anti-authoritarian person I know, going so far as to sue the USG during 'nam for false induction.

These days he gets all his news from (Michigan) broadcast TV and radio, and is pretty reclusive and doesn't talk to anyone.

The narrative he'd constructed from these limited inputs was that he's an egomaniac computer hacker who took government data and then went to China and Russia. Technically it's not false, but that's the narrative (and all the implication) he'd assembled, given only MSM reports.

I think this is much bigger news outside of the US than inside, and that's pretty sad. Then again, Obama claims "foreign entities" (thanks for pretty solidly Othering all of the 6.5+ billion other humans) are the only ones that get surveilled without a warrant.

This whole thing stinks. Why'd NSA have to pull this stupid shit anyway? Did they really think that there'd be some huge domestic unrest against the military if they DIDN'T tap everyone's phones and resultantly missed some attack that hurts fewer people than we blow up quarterly with drones?

I don't get it. The logic simply doesn't pan out, and these aren't stupid people, because you can't build information processing systems at this scale and be dumb.

I feel like I'm missing something critical.

<comment><USER18> I do credit the Three-Letter Agencies with the benefit of the doubt; they may know about dangers much scarier than shoe-bombs or even 9/11\. It does not justify the overreach of authority, but is sufficient that I do want to presume on their intentions.

Having said that, given the opportunity and no legal obstacles, it's almost stupid _not_ to soak up every last piece of data.

* If the motives are pure, they might stop a large attack, and/or avoid accusations of incompetence if an attack slips through.

* If motivated from above in the power structure, Obama or Cheney or whoever gets enough data to be ten steps ahead of political and economic foes, at home and abroad.

* If motivated from within, the agencies are able to blackmail and manipulate opponents to maintain their own budget and relevance. They might even do this out of genuine belief in their organization and mission.

* If motivated personally, a handful of powerful individuals get to maintain back-scratching relationships through selective dissemination of information, to say nothing of potential financial gains.

If I had to guess, every single one of these motives is at play at various levels. And of course, being in a position to have all this data gives one an immense amount of leverage to shut people up and hide misdeeds. Good to be the king.

Blaming the NSA for PRISM is like blaming the ocean for New Orleans. It's We The People who failed to build strong enough levees, and somebody was going to take advantage of it eventually. Time will tell if the public will accept the degree to which government institutions are openly doubling down. This is _the_ political issue of our generation; if we accept spying as the norm, it will be very hard to undo.

<comment><USER23> > Having said that, given the opportunity and no legal obstacles, it's almost > stupid not to soak up every last piece of data.

then

> Blaming the NSA for PRISM is like blaming the ocean for New Orleans.

I simply can't buy that.

It doesn't take a ton of smarts to know that a giant database such as this, even in the hands of the most kind and benevolent stewards, _will not stay in those hands forever_.

It's a ticking time bomb for abuse. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when, and how bad. It's a silent bloodless military coup in a box with a big red button on top.

Once built, something like that could never get meaningfully opposed, and a large-scale abuse would be the absolute end of freedom as we know it: everything from oppression of the free press, to coercion and blackmail of political opponents, and silencing of activists or loudmouths of any/all stripes.

I just can't see how any reasonable person, even with a 100% belief in the legitimacy of spying, even domestically, could not see what a COLOSSALLY BAD IDEA this thing is.

No conceivable threat model, even fantastic ones from Hollywood, makes it seem sane, as the damage to the "American way of life" is an order of magnitude greater from such a system than any bomb or attack.

I see what you're saying, and all of these seem like reasonable explanations, but they all become non-starters when you consider the long-term consequence of this thing being built. It's like a doomsday machine that you can't turn off.

<comment><USER18> We're definitely on the same page. What I'm getting at is the general human capacity for hubris, ideology, and group loyalty.

The One-Way Panopticon may be a horrible idea both morally and practically, but given the above human foibles, I'm not ready to jump to the easy conclusion that the perpetrators are Evil, Idiots, or Evil Idiots. People are complicated, and I ultimately lack sufficient data to assess motives. Rather, there are so many possible motives, at some point it doesn't really matter.

EDIT: I should clarify: When I say "they'd be stupid not to spy", I mean in the sense of short-sighted immediate goals. Obviously, on a larger scale, it is sheer lunacy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> I wish him the very best.

</comment><comment><USER55> "and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile"

Okay, so this guy keeps saying some pretty strange things. If he came to the States, he would no doubt be tried in the legal system. He is putting himself into an extralegal position. I think it's probably the best thing for him to do at this point, but to say that the government has in any way forced him out of the legal system is pretty silly.

<comment><USER56> > If he came to the States, he would no doubt be tried in the legal system.

How can you be so sure? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_Manning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_Manning)

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> This young man is a true American hero.

</comment><comment><USER58> What is the proof that this Statement came from Snowden directly?

<comment><USER59> I guess it depends on how much you trust Wikileaks to review information for its accuracy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> > Providing a counterbalance makes it harder for the government propaganda > machine to sway public opinion against him and turn him into Just Another > Terrorist.

Maybe he should tell Russian state media to tone it down a bit then. From [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2351981/Is-Ed- Snowde...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2351981/Is-Ed-Snowden-set- claim-asylum-Venezuela-President-Maduro-visits-Russia-tomorrow.html) :

"In several rapidly-aired shows on state-run TV, Snowden was flattered as 'a soldier in the information war, who fights, of course, _on the side of Russia_ '."

As far as Russia is concerned Snowden isn't fighting for some pan-national ideal; he's fighting on the side of Russia

</comment><comment><USER60> Role model.

[http://imgur.com/AfcF56q](http://imgur.com/AfcF56q)

</comment><comment><USER61> > using citizenship as a weapon. Although I am convicted of nothing, it has > unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me a stateless person.

And, ironically, this terrible decision of the US government, ultimately is responsible for Snowden having to stay in Moscow and probably having to tell the Russian everything he knows, even the parts he never intented to reveal. The US government just did a classical "shot yourself in the foot", I'd say.

</comment><comment><USER62> Waiting for the onion to write "Edward Snowden issues statement confirming he wrote earlier statement from Edward Snowden"

</comment><comment><USER63> I love that he included his middle name in the signature, after the US bungled its extradition request by getting that wrong.

</comment><comment><USER64> I'm sure those who signed the following doc were probably accused of egocentrism, among other things:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Declaration_of_In...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Declaration_of_Independence)

</comment><comment><USER65> I wonder what exactly happened with Hong Kong. Did he get wind that the HK govt intended to end-run its own laws and asylum process and extradite him, or something similar?

</comment><comment><USER66> I'm not sure you know how Wikileaks works "I'd really like to see Wikileaks devoting more of its time, energy, and fund-raising into breaking news about government-operated surveillance programs in the last two countries where Edward Snowden has been located, namely China and Russia."

From my understanding people submit content to Wikileaks which then decides what and when to publish. But I guess this depends on if you believe Assange pushed Mannings to release documents.

</comment><comment><USER67> I'm so very tired of WikiLeaks. Since when is this their case?

</comment><comment><USER68> Thank you, Edwin Snowden. In the end, you have made us more free.

</comment><comment><USER68> Thank you Edwin Snowden. In the end, you have made us more free.

</comment><comment><USER69> Is there a way we can send cash to Edward Snowden?

</comment><comment> guard-of-terra Best read if you can imagine a voice in your head a-la Diablo III, how various spirits of past talk.

</comment><comment><USER70> why would he date it d/m/y instead of m/d/y?

<comment><USER71> As far as I know, that is normal. Putting month first is illogical.

<comment><USER5> It's not normal in the USA (another Britishism apparently?).

In the USA a date is spoken as "July 2nd, 2013" instead of "2 July 2013", which is why the shorthand date is MM/dd/YYYY (as it lines up with the way it is spoken).

<comment><USER64> A lot of US-govt types use DMY syntax. A stint in the Armed Farces will teach you how.

<comment><USER5> Yes, we use dates such as 3 Jul 13 in the Armed Forces, but _never_ 3/7/13.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER72> edward is a very strong writer, his rhetoric is perfect.

</comment><comment><USER73> For someone who doesn't want the story to be about him, he sure talks a lot about himself...

<comment><USER74> The man is desperate for attention, but doesn't want to appear so. I guess.

<comment><USER75> How is releasing a single press release being "desperate for attention"?

A common theme among people who oppose Edward Snowden's is to criticize his character. Even within this thread people have resorted to name calling, dubbing him a "Drama Queen" and accuse him of seeking fame.

I suppose it's easier to attack a person than it is to attack the issues he stands for.

<comment><USER74> If he wasn't, he would have simply turned himself in and faced trial.

All his globe-trotting and statements just detract from the issues he's raised re: surveillance.

<comment><USER38> Unless he doesn't believe that he can get a fair and just trial. Given the history of those before him, I'd say that's a fair assumption.

<comment><USER74> I don't think it's all that fair of an assumption, and even so, he's only delaying the inevitable. He will be brought back and tried eventually.

<comment><USER76> Riiiight... He'll get fair trial and ride a unicorn over happiness mountain. All life is delaying the inevitable. Let's hope he doesn't end his in a dark cell.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Osdialog – A cross platform wrapper for native dialog boxes - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/AndrewBelt/osdialog <comment><AUTHOR> I wrote this library for developers of video games and cross platform applications to use native operating system dialog boxes using a simple consistent API. It's a work-in-progress, but most useful features work.

I'm also posting this as a call for help. I'm not an expert at all three platforms, so if you're familiar with one of the platforms and happen to see any issues with the code (e.g. memory leaks on MacOS), send a PR! I'm also happy to take requests for more types of dialogs that all platforms support, like font selection or print dialog.</comment>


Ask HN: How do you manage the immensity of online items you wish to remember? - <AUTHOR> I recently remembered a site link I had "saved" somewhere to view again later, but when I went to look for it later...
I realized it could have been a browser bookmark on mobile, or a different browser bookmark on desktop, or maybe just a tweet I "liked" for easy finding later? Or maybe it was a question I starred on StackOverflow to find later, or possibly I upvoted it on HN to "quickly" find later, but was it an HN submission or a comment? Or maybe I emailed it to myself, as I often do, and it was in my inbox? So many places..
I'm looking for recommendations for an easy way to save any link from any device and quickly view it later (i.e. not a text file in Dropbox). I don't want to be tied to a specific third-party service, like a browser sync, especially since different browsers perform differently on different devices and I don't want to be tied to one browser.
Any suggestions? I'll be sure to bookmark this thread... <comment><USER2> I've also been haunted by this dilemma as well. For now I've settled on using [https://getpocket.com](https://getpocket.com) although I worry how my data might be used.</comment>


Lost city in Darfur - <AUTHOR> http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/bdiscoe/diary/20539 <comment><USER2> I don't think of myself as a luddite in any way, but one can't help but get the feeling that the image of the world brought to us by huge tech companies has gigantic holes in it.

When you spend all of your time inside of that image of the world it's difficult to see the gaps. I love this. It's as if he walked in to a void.

<comment><USER3> Couldn't agree more. Its like a Doctor Who episode.

\- It shouldn't be there?

\- Try telling that to the local population...

<comment><USER4> The context is "unknown to online mapping projects", not "unknown to humans". He's saying "This thing is missing from the catalog".

<comment><USER3> Yes, but did you know it was missing?

My comment was to agree with the concept that its easy for me to blindly believe in what the big tech companies publish. Mapping or otherwise.

I love Doctor Who episodes where on the surface everything looks normal, but on closer inspection things are very different (eg Weeping Angels or The Silence).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm a Google employee, but don't work on maps. I also don't speak for the company... and so on and so forth.

If you zoom in on Google Maps, you can see that the city is marked as Gereida, so it's not the lost city he's claiming it is. Now, I'm happy to listen to people who think it should surface at higher zoom levels, since there's nothing around it, though I suppose that's a feature request for the maps people.

Cheers, Doug

<comment><USER6> There is a road going through it, but the city is unmarked. The conclusion in the forum is that this city is Gereida, but a search for it doesn't return anything in GM.

[https://www.google.com.br/maps/preview#!q=11%C2%B016%E2%80%B...](https://www.google.com.br/maps/preview#!q=11%C2%B016%E2%80%B236%E2%80%B3N+25%C2%B08%E2%80%B230%E2%80%B3E&data=!1m4!1m3!1d15882!2d25.1431574!3d11.2748763!2m1!1e3!4m14!2m13!1m12!3m8!1m3!1d2130!2d58.4394026!3d40.2508549!3m2!1i1147!2i679!4f35!4m2!3d11.2766667!4d25.1416667&fid=7)

<comment><USER7> [https://maps.google.com/maps?q=11.28+25.14&ll=11.275808,25.1...](https://maps.google.com/maps?q=11.28+25.14&ll=11.275808,25.14101&spn=0.006092,0.008765&t=m&z=17)

(It is not visible at lower zooms)

<comment><USER8> It is named on the map view (non-satellite) for the 3 highest zoom levels. I also doubted dmayle's allegation, but did find the label after a minute of searching. I agree with the suggestion that the label should show up on lower zoom levels.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This made me look up my local area on OSM. The streets are there, but most of the residential streets are not named. Time to do some editing tonight!

</comment><comment><USER10> It is clearly visible in the satellite views on Google Maps, but the map view only shows the main road going through it. I wonder how many other such places could be found just by browsing the web? This seems to be what this guy is doing. If you look at older posts of his, he is working on automatic road following in satellite imagery.

<comment><USER11> My friend Dr Bayliss did just that - 'discovered' an African rainforest, Mt Mabu on google earth, interesting read/chap [http://www.theguardian.com/science/grrlscientist/2013/nov/08...](http://www.theguardian.com/science/grrlscientist/2013/nov/08/mount- mabu-google-earth-maps-video)

<comment><USER10> That's pretty cool actually.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> In the last thread comment he's created a Wiki article for the place including a couple of interesting links:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gereida](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gereida)

</comment><comment><USER13> I'm not sure unmapped (on google/OSM) cities are rare at all. My daughter was born in a town in Ethiopia and it's not on any map that I've been able to find while it is listed (without lat/lng sadly) in wikipedia.

<comment><USER14> If there was only one unmapped city it would be considered rare yet there would still be thousands and thousands of people who could share your anecdote. Adding yours to this thread (albeit without any information about it) brings the number to 2 - for all I know there could be hundreds of them, but there could also only be those 2.

<comment><USER15> For much of the world no-one has ever done large scale mapping. The Soviet Union and USA produced military mapping and gazetteers for targeting, but it often lacks good on-the-ground knowledge. In rural areas it can be difficult to even get a consistent place name from people who navigate from memory.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I'm possibly going to sound dumb here, but, he said he was mapping the area and found it... How was he doing this?

Looking at aerial data/pictures and couldn't find it in a matching map or something else?

<comment><USER17> Yeah, from the way it was written it seemed to me that he was actually there, taking gps measurements. So I was thinking 'why doesn't he just ask somebody there' until I was a few paragraphs in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> the airstrip was built by my friend martijn ([https://github.com/MartijnR](https://github.com/MartijnR)) when he worked as a construction expert with the Red Cross in Darfur. He had to "hire somebody to chase away goats before plane landing".

</comment><comment><USER19> relevant: In case anybody is interested. The NGA keeps a list of placenames. I don't know if this place is on here, but it's a good resource.

[http://earth-info.nga.mil/gns/html/namefiles.htm](http://earth- info.nga.mil/gns/html/namefiles.htm)

<comment><USER20> the place has also been in geonames for a while.

[http://www.geonames.org/8504621/gereida.html#tab-c](http://www.geonames.org/8504621/gereida.html#tab-c)

[Addition]

A list of this type is traditionally called a _Gazetteer_

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gazetteer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gazetteer)

 _The Gazetteer of Sudan: Names Approved by the United States Board on Geographic Names_

as well as the file linked under the parent of this post lists this place as _Qureida /Quraydah_ as a well, with _Sa'dūn_ as the name of the nearest populated place

[http://books.google.de/books?ei=PkzPUsKSE8LOtQbc5IGYCw&id=DK...](http://books.google.de/books?ei=PkzPUsKSE8LOtQbc5IGYCw&id=DKU7AQAAMAAJ&dq=gazetteer+sudan&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=Qureida)

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Look it up in Google Earth with the USHMM layers on. Lots of "destroyed villages" are marked in the surrounding area. Interesting how this city survived while so many others nearby didn't.

Also, the imagery shown is from 2006. Something more recent would be helpful.

<comment><USER7> Bing reports November 2012.

(The capture date is reported in an http header)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Last year "Rostov na donu", a piffling little village with the Mil (helicopter) factory and several million people living in it had only two roads, according to google.

OSM had it, though.

<comment> guard-of-terra Not a problem for locals who probably still use 2GIS or Yandex maps.

<comment><USER23> Still? 2GIS is so much superior to Google Maps, it's not even funny.

<comment> guard-of-terra That's why they still use it! :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I'm surprised there are towns this large not on maps. It seems like it would be trivial for a large company like Google or Microsoft to write software that scans satellite imagery and cross checks it with current maps to see if anything large is missing. In fact, I would be surprised if they don't already do that. Although I could see this area of the world not being very high priority.

<comment><USER25> After reading the helpful wikipedia article posted elsewhere in this thread, it seems like the "city" is (or became) a refugee camp. So on old maps (the paper kind digitized by UT--and probably known to Google) it was just a wayside or a small market with a few houses. Geopolitical events led 10's of thousands of people to amass and settle there in a short time. Few places change that fast, but it's not unknown: mining booms and subsequent ghost towns (in a ghost town, the satellite image makes it look larger than its population really is).

This is further reminder that maps are not ever complete, nor intemporal. The human world (roads, buildings) change quite rapidly in both growth and decline.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Seems like you could apply some image classification techniques to automatically identify uncharted cities given access to all the satellite data.

<comment><USER27> Something like "here's a list of changes (sub cat: possible settlements)"

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Weird. Expected a spider web, not a grid..

<comment><USER29> The satelite view is a bit less organized:

[http://maps.google.com/maps?q=11.28+25.14&um=1](http://maps.google.com/maps?q=11.28+25.14&um=1)

<comment><USER30> For more perspective here's a photo of the village - which appears to be more of a camp:

[http://explore.org/photos/1725/gereida-sudan- village](http://explore.org/photos/1725/gereida-sudan-village)

In the satellite image I think it's safe to assume each white block is a tent and each dark outline is a fence. There are many dark outlines with no tents showing where the old population has moved out.

The wikipedia article explains the sudden changes in population of the settlement. It would probably explain the grid layout too.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gereida](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gereida)

<comment><USER31> It looks like the north-west part is the actual town and to the east and south is where it expanded as a camp. Of course, now there is more town than (what I assume was the original) town.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Is the guy writing this thread physically in Sudan mapping this place or is he doing it from GIS imagery?

<comment><USER33> From the little I know about the OSM project, you have to physically be in a place to map it out.

Especially a place like this, where most of the aerial photos/maps of the area are decades old.

<comment><USER7> It's clearly visible in Bing imagery:

[http://tools.geofabrik.de/mc/?lon=25.13989&lat=11.28205&zoom...](http://tools.geofabrik.de/mc/?lon=25.13989&lat=11.28205&zoom=16&num=2&mt0=mapnik&mt1=bing- satellite)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> GPS coordinates for anyone who wants to take a look: 11.2811075, 25.1414136

</comment><comment><USER34> Here's a cool lat/lng pair: 40.2526, 58.4394. Check it out on a satellite view.

<comment><USER25> Let me google that for you: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Door_to_Hell](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Door_to_Hell)

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Why would Gereida, a city with a population of 120,000 be considered a lost city just because it is not on an electronic map?The question 'Anyone care to name it?' sounds really patronizing.As if the people currently residing there could not possibly have a name for where they live.

<comment><USER36> He didn't ask people to make up a name for it, he wrote, "anyone care to find a name for the city?"

As in, can somebody do the research to find out what the city is called--by the people who live there.

<comment><USER35> Oh,sorry.I did not read that correctly</comment></comment></comment>


Rick Santorum Launches White House Bid - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/articles/rick-santorum-to-launch-second-white-house-bid-1432730474

<comment><USER2> You can view the full article and bypass the subscription wall by googling the article link. [https://www.google.com/#q=http:%2F%2Fwww.wsj.com%2Farticles%...](https://www.google.com/#q=http:%2F%2Fwww.wsj.com%2Farticles%2Frick- santorum-to-launch-second-white-house-bid-1432730474)

</comment><comment><USER3> For all your news about Rick Santorum [http://www.santorum.com/](http://www.santorum.com/)

</comment><comment><USER4> Instead of the press release, news sites should just put a link to whatever book these guys are promoting.</comment>


How To Hire Outsourced Developers - <AUTHOR> http://www.donnfelker.com/how-to-hire-outsourced-developers/ <comment><USER2> Is anyone else tired of being assigned homework when applying for jobs? In both this and the author's previous article on hiring, he mentions giving people tasks to complete by a certain deadline as part of the hiring process. For someone that's just starting out as a programmer then maybe that's reasonable, but for those of us that've been in software for years, what's the point?

You wouldn't ask a carpenter to make you a closet before you decide if you want to hire them, you look at the other houses they've created (at least, you should. There's a lot of crappy carpenters out there, and it feels like I've worked with them all). You don't ask your mechanic to change your oil for free, and then MAYBE you'll let them fix your car. So why is this just the status quo for software developers now? I have a job and family, why the hell would I want to spend my free time jumping through hoops for you when you could easily look at all the work I've already done?

I dunno, just my $0.02. I've been asked to do a lot of dumb programming challenges before job interviews, and I'm over it. I'm a professional and my time is valuable, why would I want to waste it figuring out how many ways you can turn a string of numbers into math problems?

/rant. Whew.

<comment><USER3> Can a developer on a H1-B/TN/etc visa in the US legally do these homework assignments?

<comment><USER4> IANAL. They can do the homework in their free time, but they can most probably not get paid for it. [http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/part-time-work- multip...](http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/part-time-work-multiple- employers-h-1b-workers.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for posting this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Side question: don't other people also have _serious issues_ with the practice of using tracking software that take screenshots, or even worse, webcam shots?

When I was freelancing I quickly refused a lot of potentially well paying jobs because of the requirement to use such monitoring software (their loss imho...). I don't have a problem with video-chatting with an employer about anything, or even with a temporary screen-share during a testing task or interview process, but having my actual work _monitored_ like this felt like a total invasion of "my space".

I don't know about you, but doing it this "big brother-ish" way feels very demeaning and I refuse to work for people that treat me like that and I hate it that it's starting to become a "standard" nowadays, at least for "low level" work.

<comment><USER6> During college I had a job in a coffee shop, and one day after a slow afternoon the bossman came in and later called me over to his computer, where he was reviewing his CCTV footage, and said "Look at how long it took you to make this cappucino, this is simply unacceptable!". I walked out.

<comment><USER7> Now imagine if your family relied on you having this job? How awful would that be.

<comment><USER6> Yup. And to be honest, the surveillance was not even the worst part, the guy was just generally a shitbag. But yeah, considering all the scandals and such involving corporations spying on employees, it's probably safe to say that it's mostly the most vulnerable people who have to put up with it. But IT freelancing is probably too much of a niche for there to be any public outrage about stuff like spying on contractors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "Cut anyone who's English (or whatever your chosen 5/5 language is) is terrible and very difficult to read"

Oh the irony!

<comment><USER9> maybe it was intended? lol

<comment><AUTHOR> No, just a lack of coffee. Fixed now. :)

<comment><USER10> One more.

" If the average wage of your applicants is between $5 and $25 _and_ hour "

s/and/an

<comment><AUTHOR> Fixed. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> +1 for no ~foreign people are dumb~ undertones I've seen in other posts. I'm brasilian and I'm sure my skills could punch the skills of some developers elsewhere in the face, even if I make less. If you don't respect people who you work with, what are you? That's why, also, I'm at my last remote job, after this one goes, I'm getting back to local and corporate stuff.. Current one is great, but I've had enough bad experiences

<comment><USER12> It's not that foreign people are dumb, it's that foreign dumb people become developers. American dumb people do other stuff.

<comment><USER13> It's not even that. It's that good developers don't need to bid on outsourcing sites.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> We do something similar if we are hiring a remote freelancer. Although first thing we look for is github code, then we do a short call, and then if that all looks good we do a 10 hour paid task. We then scale the work up from there with larger and larger tasks as our trust in them grows, because, as we've found, the hardest part of hiring freelancers is getting people that can reliably deliver. You don't want to give someone a too large task initially because the risk of them not delivering is too high and you need to know that you can cover the work if necessary.

<comment><AUTHOR> Excellent. I like it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> This post doesn't contemplate one of the biggest problems on Odesk. The best of the "team" will perform the test. Then they put one of their low level team members on after the team leader passes the test.

The only way I have learned to work around the problem is to require use of the odesk time tracker with WEBCAM. Can't hide who is doing the work with the WEBCAM taking shots of the person. :)

<comment><USER16> Another way to handle this is to NOT hire teams, but hire independents. That's what I do on oDesk, to ensure the person you hired is the one doing the work.

<comment><USER15> Unfortunately it can't be avoided. I've always asked the question and most will say they work alone but then proceed to have team members do the work. It can become a big waste of time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Do people go through this much to hire from oDesk?

A while back I would just hire 3 people for the same project. One would always stand out pretty early and I would stick with them after the first week. After a few projects I had a list of great people which I still use today.

</comment><comment><USER18> A couple of transcribed episodes from 'Startups for the Rest of Us':

How to Hire and Manage Virtual Assistants

[http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/episodes/episode-68-ho...](http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/episodes/episode-68-how- to-hire-and-manage-virtual-assistants)

How to Hire Like a Bootstrapper with Special Guest Laura Roeder

[http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/episodes/episode-143-h...](http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/episodes/episode-143-how- to-hire-like-a-bootstrapper-with-special-guest-laura-roeder)

<comment><AUTHOR> Rob also has a great course on Udemy which shares a lot of the same philosophies that I do. View that here: [https://www.udemy.com/startups-guide- hiring-virtual-assistan...](https://www.udemy.com/startups-guide-hiring- virtual-assistant-va/) I highly recommend it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Nice insights. Thank you for sharing.

This is simple. If you are hiring an engineer you should be one too. This way you can hire faster and fire faster. No bullshit.

Outsourcing work overseas is 5x cheaper than local try-and-see-how-it-goes. Not a long term solution but a short term one to get stuff done. Hire fast, fire fast. So if you make a mistake move fast to get another one on the job. You wont bleed as much money from a mistake of outsourcing to the wrong candidate.

I have been through this a number of times over the years and documented my learnings on outsourcing pros & cons here: [http://www.theroadtosiliconvalley.com/technology/outsourcing...](http://www.theroadtosiliconvalley.com/technology/outsourcing- work-overseas/)

</comment><comment><USER20> "Something interesting happens at this point in the process. An average of 50% of the candidates never continue past this step. The reason is not exactly known but I suspect it is because they simply do not know how to perform the task that is given to them"

If you're picking 10 candidates and only (initially) asking them for 1 hour's work, they're probably dropping off due to lack of interest in your project. They might not be taking you seriously.

<comment><AUTHOR> I should clarify, I hire them for 1 hour and if they succeed in the task and I like their work I'll hire them for the project.

RE $5/hr - You'd be surprised what kind of applicants you get from around the world. I've had a very good iOS developer from India for $12/hr for awhile now. Great find. I also give my workers bonuses if they finish early, go above and beyond, etc. Key thing: Take care of people and most likely they'll take care of you.

<comment><USER20> Looks like I edited out my $5 an hour remark before I saw your reply. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Hijacking the thread...

I'm from Brazil and would like to get jobs elsewhere (the rates here are just sad). I've looked into oDesk and Elance, but the jobs / conditions suck. I've also tried getting in touch directly with companies when I see job postings, but it seems there's a barrier to hire from this side of the hemisphere.

Does anyone know any good site focused on remote job postings?

<comment><USER22> careers.stackoverflow.com has some remote jobs posts (they have an 'allow remote' flag, but a lot of times they actually don't, but some do).

There is also weworkremotly.com and some github.com ones, but you can check jobmote.com as it acts sorta like an aggregator for these sites.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> A challenge that involves creating a small app in just an hour or two, with tight guidelines to follow? Sure it's doable, but this says to me - I'm not looking for someone creative. I just need a code monkey that can follow instructions.

</comment><comment><USER24> What do people think of the OP's test repo?

[https://github.com/donnfelker/example-rails- challenge](https://github.com/donnfelker/example-rails-challenge)

This is a sensible test, I guess, but the OP is just satisfied that the devs know basic syntax and conventions? Would it be more productive to ask more open-ended questions...such as, instead of telling exactly what tests they should write, ask them to write tests that verify the system is working.

Hell even if they did it in Minitest, that ability to conceptually prove how systems in Rails work would seem more valuable than knowing RSpec convention

<comment><AUTHOR> You could totally do this. I think variation like this are great. I do this all the time. Depends on the type of developer I'm after. I've had advanced challenges/etc. One of my best hires went above and beyond my requirements and stated (in the pull request) that we could do X, Y and Z to improve the code and test coverage. I hired them and they helped me launch a product. But I agree, you can do exactly what you said. Feel free to take this and change it up. :)

<comment><USER25> MiniTest has 'rspec syntax' with 99% less dirty fucking hacks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> In a somewhat related question... remember the guy[1] who worked at Verizon who out-sourced his job? I'd sure love for him to write up exactly what/who/when/how he did that and got it to work out so smoothly; except for the part where he got fired.

1\. [http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo- way/2013/01/16/169528579/out...](http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo- way/2013/01/16/169528579/outsourced-employee-sends-own-job-to-china-surfs-web)

</comment><comment><USER27> In the android app the line "Create a ListView that groups the recent commits by author in a custom view." is confusing to me. What I get from that is something of this form:

        author1:
            commit1
            commit2
            ...
        author2:
            ...

however the example jpg doesnt look like it.

<comment><AUTHOR> I can see how this could be confusing. However, this is an opportunity for the candidate to communicate with me. In the real world, features are not always 100% fleshed out and sometimes you need clarification. This could be used as one such example. But, I agree, this could probably be improved a bit. Thanks for reading. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Does anybody have an idea about how to stand out in the crowd where many remote developers disappear, replace themselves with somebody else in their team without telling you, and so on?

This is my biggest problem now. I've been freelancing for about a year, and so far I got every single one of my jobs through friends and ex-colleagues. Currently I live in Hungary and there is an obvious demand for the things I do (mainly Android and back-end Java stuff), so I'm pretty sure there is somebody out there who could use somebody like me with a better rate than back home.

But it's not easy to build trust, especially over the internet, if the default position of the client is that you must be doing something shady unless proven otherwise.

</comment><comment><USER7> This works if you already know how to code, and can come up with a quick 1 hour problem for them to solve. And it is a lot of work on your side as well. Filtering the list, checking the code, making sure they didn't cheat by checking github logs, pay someone else to review the candidates.

It would almost be quick to post the job online, break it up into stages, hire someone, check their progress, and move to the next person if their work is not satisfactory.

</comment><comment><USER29> I am right now trying to score some freelance work, I found a gig at elance and put in a proposal. That gig had almost 200 proposals, how would the job poster even filter these out? It sounds tough and tedious job. Your guidelines makes sense and also tells me how my prospective clients might be thinking.

Thanks for the article, it was a great read.

</comment><comment><USER30> If you're doing a fixed price project, how can you get oDesk to let you hire the candidates for just one hour?</comment>


Show HN: Antibait – Protects you from clickbaits - <AUTHOR> https://www.antibait.com <comment><USER2> Although this is a great idea, I was baited in adding this chrome plugin only to realize only those websites were supported:

buzzfeed.com edition.cnn.com europe.newsweek.com gazeteciler.com haber7.com haberturk.com huffingtonpost.com hurriyet.com.tr sabah.com.tr theatlantic.com theguardian.com

<comment><AUTHOR> Just click on extension button at any website that you want to use. If it wasn't supported send request for that site, and I will be adding support for it.

Also I'm working on independent solution for supporting all websites. Right now there is a backend that crawls supported sites for title and descriptions.

edit: also sorry for not mentioning that supported sites, I was too excited while sharing this at HN.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Any chance of this (or something like it) appearing for Pale Moon or Firefox?

<comment><AUTHOR> I was planning to do.

<comment><USER3> Thank you! I'm looking forward to it with bated breath.</comment></comment></comment>